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Would You Do It? Pose For a Painting In Your Birthday Suit?

I’m daring in lots of ways. Not in the jump-out-of-an-airplane way, but in plenty of ways that allow me to keep my feet on the ground. Top of my list of daring maneuvers is having kids– letting their gestations and births and subsequent physicality wreak whatever havoc on my body as comes to pass. To me, that’s braver than jumping out of an airplane because having kids lasts a whole lot longer than the time it takes to float back to solid ground. (Though, I’d have to be drugged with a fistful of “roofies” before I’d consent to skydiving.)

Before I had kids, I did brave stuff too. Getting into recovery– that ain’t for the chicken-hearted. Giving up caffeine– now that’s not for the timid either. Going to law school. Traveling abroad alone. On-line dating. When I think back on those things, I have the urge to pat younger me on the back and say, “You’ve got spunk, little lady.”

I also once posed au natural for an artist who was doing a series of pieces on the Holocaust. For someone who can’t draw a credible stick figure, the chance to help create art was compelling. And also a little vain– I’d just run the Chicago marathon and thought, “Well, if I don’t bear it all now, when would I? I’ll never have a body this tight again.”

I think that was a true enough statement. However, I’ve been rethinking my motives for posing. And, I’ll just cut to the chase: I’m thinking I might do it again even though…. Even though my body has been altered by gravity, childbirth, and plenty of chocolate ice cream and salty carbs. Even though I’ve looked better. Even though I can’t wear a forgiving black ensemble when the artist needs a naked body.

There are lots of reasons not to do it. But the reasons to go for it are winning out.

To read more about my round-trip journey to contributing my body to the art world, please click HERE.

I’ve done a lot of nude modeling and I am certainly not the skinniest girl in the bunch (or the most in shape, thanks girlscouts!!!) I found it to be one of the most liberating things I’ve ever done. Scary as hell, but I started to learn to love all of those bumps and curves that I had previously been told were ugly. It was also some of the most fun I’ve ever had.

I LOVE both these posts, Christie. I am having a hard time reconciling myself to my wrinkly, stretch-marky belly, even though I’m more proud of those kids than of anything else in my life. A friend of mine is thinking of doing a photo series about post-pregnancy bodies, and I think it’s amazing to use these scars and lines and – badges of honour, shall we say, for art. BRAVA and GOOD FOR YOU, times a billion.